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Import Face-Off Bakersfield 2017

IFO’s drag season officially kicks off

If you’re not actively involved in the sport compact drag racing community, or rarely keep tabs on current happenings, you probably think the sport is long gone – and you couldn’t be any more incorrect. A movement that not only established the import enthusiast presence in the U.S. in its early days, drag racing has remained a staple in both performance development and culture, even if your Instagram feed tells you otherwise.

February 26th marked the opening day of the largest import drag race and car show series in the west: Import Face-Off. With over 15 years under their belt, the IFO crew’s schedule remains consistent, and year after year drivers continue to take part, many of them piloting Honda/Acura chassis.

Throughout the day blue skies were met with a slathering of grey, and while clouds threatened, Mother Nature managed to cooperate enough to allow the event to run the length of the day. With temperatures hovering around 60 degrees, ETs were impressive – in fact, the SFWD times proved to be a force, inching closer to Pro Outlaw territory. With a full season in front of them, teams gathered data to make the necessary changes to come back even stronger next round.

The Sipes Bros decided to pick up and drive 16 hours to Bakersfield in order to debut their Blox-sponsored SFWD Civic and clicked off a personal best of 8.29 seconds at 179mph to earn the win. If the name sounds familiar but you can’t quite place it, you might remember their all-motor monster featured back in 2013.

Even if you don’t follow any sort of Honda drag racing, you undoubtedly know about this car. It’s the one that shuts up the anti-Honda crowd faster than any other. Speedfactory’s James Kempf continued his barrage of passes that, over the past few years, fans have almost come to expect. It was a strong 8.03 @198.79 at Bakersfield that earned their Outlaw Class win. Their Civic EH also appeared in Honda Tuning magazine back in 2012.

In the mid ‘90s, 2nd gen Integras were everywhere on race day; today however they’re few and far between. That makes cars like this blue DA, and this DB2 we featured recently, that much cooler to see on track!

Once upon a time TB Motorworx was the B-series underdog. Surrounded by K-power in the All-Motor Class, he made his way with a tall deck B-series. Since then, he’s moved on to a J-series set up in his Integra. Here’s a look back at his HT feature.

Our Toyo Tires calendar is something we look forward to every year, not just because we get to snap photos of the Toyo girls, but because of all the dope car meets that go along with the calendar's launch.